Northern Ireland Constitutional Convention Elections 1975

The 1975 Constitutional Convention was established to consider
"what provisions for the government of Northern Ireland is likely
to command the most widespread acceptance throughout the community
there". The 78 members were elected on the same basis as the 1973
Assembly, with the same distribution of members among the 12
parliamentary seats.

The election produced a victory for the United Ulster Unionist
Council, whose three component parties and an allied independent
held 46 of the 78 seats. The report produced by the Convention
inevitably reflected the UUUC policy, and was basically ignored by
the rest of the world. The elections also revealed the weakness of
Faulkner's own position within Unionism, as his Unionist Party of
Northern Ireland won only five seats.

The most important political effect of the Convention was the
disintegration of Vanguard. At one point in the proceedings in
September 1975, William Craig, the leader of the Vanguard party,
floated the idea of a voluntary coalition between Unionists and
SDLP. This was too much for the majority of his party to take, and
they broke away under deputy leader Ernest Baird to form the
United Ulster Unionist Movement (UUUM), subsequently the UUUP.
Craig and his new deputy leader, David Trimble, folded the
remnants of Vanguard into the UUP shortly after.

Comparisons are with the Assembly election
in 1973.
NB1: UUP-UUUC votes and seats in 1975 are compared with
anti-White Paper UUP votes and seats in 1973. John Laird's 1973
votes are tallied with "Other Unionists" as his principal
designation then was as a West Belfast Loyalist Coalition
candidate, and Roy Bradford's 1975 votes are tallied separately,
as he did not have UUUC endorsement.
NB2: UPNI votes and seats in 1975 are compared with pro-White
Paper UUP candidates.
NB3: The West Belfast Loyalist Coalition votes and seats from
1973 are tallied with "Other Unionists" above, though two of the
three WBLC Assembly members were (successful) UUP candidates in
this election.

Analysis

The closest results were:

Lord Brookeborough (UPNI) defeated Neil Oliver
(UUP-UUUC) by 20 votes
in North Down; the final margin was
fractionally more than the total value of two UUUC undistributed
surpluses which would have made the final result tighter still.

David Allen (Vanguard-UUUC) defeated Adam Erwin
(UUP-UUUC) by 48 votes
in North Antrim

For the UUP this was a consolidation election. 19 seats
(and two near misses) was sharply down from the combined total of
both wings of the party in 1973, but still twice what the
anti-White Paper faction had managed in that year and enough to be
the biggest single party in both seats and votes.
The SDLP lost three seats despite actually increasing
their percentage share of the vote. The increase was restricted to
Belfast and counties Antrim and Down; in three of the other four
constituencies their vote dropped sufficiently to lose a seat, in
two cases very narrowly.
The DUP had a good election, though better balancing of
candidates -and indeed a few more candidates - would have meant
more seats.Vanguard got a superb result, doubling from 7 to 14 seats
on a share of the vote that should have got them only 8. They
benefited from lousy balancing by their coalition partners, and
also from a couple of lucky breaks. Of course, this was the peak
from which they rapidly declined.Alliance lost a seat in North Belfast and gained one in
South Belfast.
The UPNI were essentially exposed as a busted flush by the
election; with only five seats out of 78 in the Convention -
indeed, only five out of 51 Unionist seats - they were not going
to be key players in the future.
The Republican Clubs were never in contention in any
constituency, and ran too many candidates.
The NILP was fortunate to hang on to their East Belfast
seat, and came within a thousand votes in North Belfast.
Of the Other Unionists, Frank Millar Sr won in fissile
North Belfast whose six Convention representatives represented
five different political designations. Hughie Smyth, outside the
UUUC, held his seat in West Belfast as an Independent Unionist.

The spirit of '73...

Of the 165 candidates in the 1973 Assembly election, 85
(52%) had been candidates for the 1975 Convention election (21
SDLP, 14 UUP including two of the 1973 West Belfast Loyalist
Coalition, 12 Alliance, 11 UPNI of whom ten had been pro-White
Paper UUP candidates in 1973 and one and independent Unionist, 9
DUP, 8 Vanguard, 5 NILP, 2 Republican Clubs, 2 other Unionists
who had been pro-White Paper UUP candidates in 1973, and one
Independent Unionist who had been in the 1973 West Belfast
Loyalist Coalition).

Of these 85,

55 were elected to both the 1973 Assembly and the Convention
(15 SDLP, 13 UUP including two elected to the Assembly as
members of the West Belfast Loyalist Coalition, 7 UPNI
including six pro-White Paper UUP Assembly members and one
independent Unionist, 6 DUP not counting their winner of the
1974 Assembly by-election who was also elected to the
Convention, 6 Vanguard, 6 Alliance, 1 Independent Unionist
elected to the Assembly as a member of the West Belfast
Loyalist Coalition, and 1 NILP).

9 were elected to the Assembly but failed to get elected to
the
Convention (4 former pro-White Paper Unionists who were now
in the UPNI, 3 SDLP, 1 Alliance, and 1 former pro-White
Paper Unionist running as UUP without UUUC support in 1975)

4 members of the Convention had been unsuccessful candidates
in 1973
(2 DUP, one of whom had subsequently won a by-election, and
2 Vanguard) and

Women in the Convention election

Only four women (5.1% of the total membership) were elected to
the Convention, Anne Dickson (UPNI, South Antrim), Eileen Paisley
(DUP, East Belfast), Jean Coulter (UUP, West Belfast) and Shena
Conn (UUP, Londonderry). All four had also been elected to the
Assembly in 1973. Only seven of the 165 candidates (4.2%)
were women; the three unsuccessful female candidates were Iris
Agnew (UPNI, North Antrim), Kate Condy (Alliance, East Belfast)
and Edith Goligher (DUP, West Belfast). East Belfast and West
Belfast both had two women candidates of whom one was successful
in each case, East Belfast had the higher number of first
preferences (5091, 10.1%) but West Belfast the higher percentage
(12.0%, on 4283 first preferences). The percentage of women
candidates by party is as follows: UPNI 11.1%, DUP 11.1%, UUP
7.4%, Alliance 4.3%, and a big zero for the SDLP, Vanguard, NILP,
Republican Clubs and Communists.